Sociology: Groups, Organizations, and Social Change

Vocabulary flashcards covering groups, formal organizations, bureaucracies, and social change.

Whistle-blowing

The revealing by an employee of organizational practices that the employee believes to be illegal and/or immoral.

Groupthink

A group dynamic that impairs critical judgment, stifles individual creativity, and discourages members from raising moral, legal, or procedural doubts regarding group practices.

Instrumental Leaders

Leaders who focus primarily on solving tasks and achieving goals, even at the potential risk of alienating group members.

Expressive Leaders

Leaders who concentrate on maintaining group harmony, interpersonal relationships, and collective morale.

Vehicles for Social Change

Groups and collective movements through which individuals organize to achieve social reforms and expand civil rights.

Formal Organization

A large secondary group that follows explicit rules and procedures to achieve specific tasks and goals.

Utilitarian Organizations

Formal organizations (also called remunerative organizations) that individuals join in order to receive an income or another personal benefit.

McDonaldization

A concept coined by George Ritzer describing the spread of corporate characteristics like uniformity, predictability, speed, and efficiency at the expense of originality, diversity, and creativity.

Normative Organizations

Formal organizations (also known as voluntary organizations or voluntary associations) that individuals join without compensation to pursue moral goals and commitments.

Coercive Organizations

Formal organizations that individuals enter involuntarily, such as prisons, jails, and state mental institutions, due to legal violations or being deemed mentally ill.

Bureaucracy

A large formal organization characterized by specific organizational features designed to accomplish tasks in the most efficient and rational way possible.

Specialization

A bureaucratic division of labor in which specific individuals are assigned certain tasks—and only those tasks—based on their specialized skill set.

Bureaucratic Hierarchy

A pyramid-shaped chain of command where supervisory authority and ultimate decision-making power are concentrated among top officials.

Bureaucratic Ritualism

A condition in a bureaucracy where devotion to rules, regulations, and red tape becomes greater than commitment to organizational goals, as conceptualized by Robert Merton.

Trained Incapacity

An inability of organizational members to think creatively or act independently when unexpected problems occur, formulated by Thorstein Veblen.

Parkinson's Law

The principle formulated by C. Northcote Parkinson stating that work expands to fill the time available for its completion.

Peter Principle

The concept formulated by Laurence J. Peter stating that employees in a hierarchy tend to rise until they are promoted to their level of incompetence.

Goal Displacement

A process where a bureaucracy becomes preoccupied with rule adherence, personnel comfort, and self-perpetuation, losing sight of its original foundational purpose.

Iron Law of Oligarchy

Robert Michels's theory predicting that large organizations inevitably develop undemocratic governance by a small elite who monopolize information and entrench their power.

Office Ladies

A category of young female workers in Japanese corporations whose designated functions are largely restricted to basic tasks like photocopying, filing, and visitor reception prior to marriage.

Black Church

A prominent normative organization in the African American community that functioned as a vital hub for civil rights organizing and fundraising during the 1960s.

Imprisonment Rate

The measure of incarceration frequency calculated as the number of inmates per $100{,}000$ residents within a specific geographic region.